


Cactus

by purglepurglepurgle



Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Frenemies, Gardens & Gardening, Gen, I Don't Even Know, Midgar, OG Tseng is a douchecanoe, cactusverse, midgar shall I compare thee to a summer's day in the city centre, my balcony overlooks ten carparks, oversized drabble I guess, that I shall, willowherb can survive anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 22:57:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19386214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purglepurglepurgle/pseuds/purglepurglepurgle
Summary: Aeris starts gardening. Experimental oneshot.





	Cactus

**Author's Note:**

> I only treat the original game as canon in my fics.

Midgar stank of tarmac, diesel, and cigarette smoke. Aeris Gainsborough pulled up her jacket collar, covering her nose.  
    It was late winter. Not that you could tell, under the plate. Aeris chewed spongy mouthfuls of grey bread in her mom's kitchen, with all the windows slammed shut, to keep the stench out. She remembered. Belted tight into a jeep, windows down, racing past fields and valleys, when Shinra had first taken her, as a child, making the long journey South. Sunlight, sky. Her mother had been scared, and Aeris had been scared because her mother had been scared, but the breeze on her face had tasted of blossom. It had been the first time she'd seen petals fall; she'd been used to snow. "Flowers..." Her mother had gripped her shoulders, fighting back tears. Ifalna had realised the pair of them would probably never see flowers again. Well, she'd been right about herself.  
    Aeris' hand tightened on her knife. Now, she was 16. She was out of the Shinra building, but stuck in Midgar: dark, stuffy, _smelly_ Midgar, with the klaxons that blared at all hours and the neon lights that made her head pound. Whenever the trains rattled above, flecks of dust floated down, sticking to people's skin and hair until they resembled ghosts. Everywhere she looked, she saw piles of dirt and ash and god knew what. The ground belched cancerous fumes.  
    The kitchen walls pressed in on her. Elmyra's curtains were decorated with floral print-- there were many _pictures_ of flowers in Midgar, and fake plastic ones, like those in Elmyra's vases. The vases, themselves, were patterned with crude imitations of flowers.  
_In a few generations, nobody here will know what a real flower looks like._  
    Aeris reflected that there were probably already kids born in the slums who didn't know.  
    Acrid smoke drifted under the door. Someone had left their truck running outside. That did it.  
    Aeris threw her chair back from the table. She'd had _enough_.      
    *  
    Aeris grabbed her purse, stomped over to Wall Market, and practically emptied the corner shop of discount seeds. Every variety. They were cheap; nothing _grew_ in Midgar.  
    _Not **yet**._  
    Aeris would _make_ them grow. Through force of numbers, or sheer force of will, she would get some damn plants.  
    Once she'd returned with the seeds, sweaty and angry, she realised she still had no _soil_. So she had to make the long trip to Sector 6 all over again, lugging the bag of compost back in the midday heat. The plastic dug grooves in her fingers, and her back ached, but she was energised by spite. It would be worth it.  
    She shook the soil out into old food tins, broken pans, abandoned shoes; anything and everything that could serve as a plantpot. She liked the idea of reusing the containers; it felt clever, and against everything the Shinra stood for. When that was done, she doused the surfaces in seeds, so that the earth looked more brown than black, then shoved another layer of soil on top. _Something_ would grow. She slammed the pots down, and left them on the windowsill. She'd get decent air _in_ the house, if nothing else.  
    The months passed. Steadily, Aeris grew a garden.  
    It was a Midgar garden, with Midgar plants. Her sunflowers were rangy, drooping (where was the _sun_?)-- but alive. The leaves were brownish in some places, whitish in others, and fly-bitten. Her roses were covered in dark spots. Aphids left their sticky spit all over the willowherb leaves, and the daffodils were shrunken, fragile things, more cream than yellow. The marigolds refused to flower. But the plants kept going.  
    The green grew. She moved some pots outside, planted more. As the weeks passed, flowers started to bloom in the slums.  
    The neighbours complained. Envy. They pretended she was attracting flies.  
    _They leave open bags of rubbish every five paces._  
    But Aeris sorted it out. She offered free cuttings, for people to display indoors, and the complaints mysteriously vanished.  
    "Why are you giving them away?" said Tseng, once, when he saw her hand a man a bouquet. Tseng's lip curled at the buddleja flowering in a teapot. He nudged it with his foot.  
    Aeris moved it out of his reach as she explained.  
    Tseng snorted. "You should _sell_ them."  
    She folded her arms. "Maybe I _will_."  
    And so, in a weird way, she had the Shinra's mockery to thank for her business. The flower shop expanded fast; she ran out of room in her mom's yard. After searching for new premises, she stumbled upon an abandoned church. Tseng found it funny; he liked the idea of a religious building being repurposed for capitalism. But she refused to let him spoil it.  
    He spoiled everything else. When she sold her flowers, she'd people-watch, gazing at the women entering and leaving the bars-- women in short shorts, glittery things, makeup, high heels. Aeris wished she could try it out. Her mother bought all her clothes -- the twee dresses, whites and pinks and the occasional pastel blue if she was feeling _daring_. Aeris wore them without complaint; money was tight and Elmyra tried her best. But. But.  
    _Aeris_ wanted to look _sexy_. She bet it would be good for business, too. She wanted a tank top, a miniskirt, like the ones the local barmaids wore. She wanted a leather jacket. She wanted to try a push-up bra.  
    But the Shinra was always there. _Tseng_ was always there.  
    She couldn't think of anything more mortifying than Tseng laughing at her style experiments. She could picture the look of disdain, the metallic-cold smile. He'd say something like, "Very sophisticated", and she'd never be able to face the clothes again. He was bad enough as it was.  
    "You really should join the Shinra," he said, once. "You'd be safer there. The slums are no place for a girl with... three hair ribbons? Impressive."  
    She tensed. The ribbons had been her mother's. She would wear all of them, and then some. But she wasn't going to tell him that. "I'm fine."  
    "Sell me a flower," he said, another time. "Go on."  
    She refused.  
    "Mistake. General Affairs have more disposable income than most."  
    "Leave me alone," she muttered. He didn't, of course. He lit a cigarette and leaned against the crumbling church wall.  
    "You know I can't do that." His tone was so smug, so supercilious, she wanted to punch him. She'd got a little muscle from hauling bags of compost-- but not enough.  
    "Don't you get bored?" she asked once, when he was There Again, getting in her way as she tried to select more seeds from the shop shelf. By now, she knew which grew quickly and which weren't worth the hassle. She also knew that Tseng only got in the way when he chose to get in the way.  
    "How could I get bored?" Tseng replied. "You're the Last Ancient. I get to accompany the Last Ancient to the shops." Tseng didn't believe in Ancients. Tseng didn't believe in anything. Except doing his job, apparently.  
    So, no short skirts for Aeris. She settled for a button-up dress, where she could at least vary the number of fastened buttons-- and do them all up quickly if she caught a glimpse of a navy blue suit in her peripheral vision.  
    Then, one day, she met Zack.  
    Tseng was his usual self. "A boyfriend in the military? What could go wrong?"  
    But a few weeks later, when it was clear that Zack was there to stay, she found a parcel outside her door. Neat, blue wrapping. Another Shinra recruitment gift? Or something from Zack?  
    She opened it in her bedroom. A slip of paper fell out.  
_"If you have a kid, the Shinra will take it from you. Don't be an idiot. -T"_  
    A box of condoms.  
    She hid them inside a scented pillow her mom had given her for some past birthday. Elmyra would die if she saw. Aeris' own face burned, but coupled with the humiliation, she felt a faint sense of relief. She'd had no idea how she was going to ask old Mr. Botts, the pharmacist, in person, when he'd known her since she was 8, and would definitely tell her mom. And she couldn't ask _Zack_. They weren't even at that point yet... but she'd rather be prepared...  
    Next time she saw Tseng, she supposed she had to thank him. "Er--"  
    "I know what soldiers are like," Tseng cut her off. He was looking somewhere over her shoulder, expression bored. "Elmyra can clutch her pearls and dress you in pink all she likes, but that's not a tested method of contraception. Following one Ancient around is bad enough." He stubbed out his cigarette. "Get a checkup sometime. He probably has syphilis."  
    They didn't speak of it again. But the church filled with flowers. And sometimes, Tseng helped her pick them.

**Author's Note:**

> This was an experimental ramble where I got curious about the Aeris-Tseng dynamic midway through. I have about 5 different contradictory headcanons for Tseng (apparently one of those is contraception!grinch ?), and they're fun to explore. Not sure about this piece, though. May orphan it.


End file.
